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copies by degrees, and advancing towards a better practice, as he gains more confidence in himfelf.

In his tranflation of Virgil, written when he was about twenty-one years old, may be ftill found the old manner of continuing the fenfe ungracefully from verse to verfe.

"Then all thofe

"Who in the dark our fury did escape,

"Returning, know our borrow'd arms, and shape,
"And differing dialect: then their numbers fwell.
And grow upon us; firft Chorobus fell
"Before Minerva's altar; next did bleed
"Juft Ripheus, whom no Trojan did exceed
"In virtue, yet the gods his fate decreed.
"Then Hypanis and Dymas, wounded by
"Their friends; nor thee, Pantheus, thy piety,
"Nor confecrated mitre, from the fame
"Ill fate could fave; my country's funeral flame
"And Troy's cold ashes I attest, and call
"To witness for myself, that in their fall
No foes, or death, nor danger I declin'd,
"Did and deferv'd no lefs, my fate to find."

From this kind of concatenated metre he afterwards refrained, and taught his followers the art of concluding their fenfe in couplets; which has perhaps been with rather too much conftancy pursued.

This paffage exhibits one of thofe triplets which are not infrequent in this firft effay, but which it is to be fuppofed his maturer judgement difapproved, fince in his latter works he has totally forborn them.

His rhymes are fuch as feem found without difficulty, by following the fenfe; and are for the moft part as

éxact at least as those of other poets, though now and then the reader is fhifted off with what he can get.

"O how transform'd!

66

How much unlike that Hector, who return'd
Clad in Achilles' spoils!

And again:

"From thence a thousand leffer poets sprung,

"Like petty princes from the fall of Rome."

Sometimes the weight of rhyme is laid upon a word too feeble to sustain it:

Troy confounded falls
"From all her glories: if it might have stood
"By any power, by this right hand it shou’d.
"And though my outward ftate misfortune hath
"Depreft thus low; it cannot reach my faith."

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Thus by his fraud and our own faith o'ercome, "A feigned tear destroys us, against whom

"Tydides nor Achilles could prevail,

" Nor ten years conflict, nor a thousand sail."

He is not very careful to vary the ends of his verfes: in one paffage the word die rhimes three couplets in fix.

Most of these petty faults are in his first productions, when he was less skilful, or at least less dexterous in the ufe of words; and though they had been more frequent they could only have leffened the grace, not the ftrength of his compofition. He is one of the writers that improved our taste, and advanced our language, and whom we ought therefore to read with gratitude, though, having done much, he left much to do.

VOL. II.

G

MILTON.

[82]

MIL TO N.

TH

HE Life of Milton has been already written im fo many forms, and with fuch minute enquiry, that I might perhaps more properly have contented myself with the addition of a few notes to Mr. Fenton's elegant Abridgement, but that a new narrative was thought neceffary to the uniformity of this edition.

JOHN MILTON was by birth a gentleman, defcended from the proprietors of Milton near Thame in Oxfordshire, one of whom forfeited his eftate in the times of York and Lancafter. Which fide he took I know not; his defcendant inherited no veneration for the White Rofe.

His grandfather John was keeper of the forest of Shotover, a zealous papift, who difinherited his fon, because he had forfaken the religion of his ancestors.

His father, John, who was the fon difinherited, had recourfe for his fupport to the profeffion of a fcrivener.

He

He was a man eminent for his skill in mufick *, many of his compofitions being still to be found; and his reputation in his profeffion was fuch, that he grew rich, and retired to an eftate. He had probably more than common literature, as his fon addreffes him in one of his most elaborate Latin poems. He married a gentlewoman of the name of Cafton, a Welsh family, by whom he had two fons, John the poet, and Chriftopher who ftudied the law, and adhered, as the law taught him, to the King's party, for which he was awhile perfecuted; but having, by his brother's intereft, obtained permiffion to live in quiet, he fupported himself so honourably by chamber-practice, that foon after the acceffion of King James, he was knighted and made a Judge; but, his constitution being too weak for business, he retired before any difreputable compliances became neceffary.

He had likewise a daughter Anne, whom he married with a confiderable fortune to Edward Philips, who came from Shrewsbury, and rofe in the Crown-office to be fecondary: by him the had two fons, John and Edward, who were educated by the poet, and from whom

*Indeed fo eminent as to rank among the first practical compofers in his time. Philips, mentioned in the next page, fays, that for a compofition of his he was prefented by a Polish prince with a gold medal and chain. An anthem of his compofing may be feen in "The General Hiftory of the Science and Practice of Mufic, 4to." 1776, vol. III. page 369.

As a judge he was not eminent; not a fingle dictum of his is recorded in any report book of his time; nor does his name appear, fave among thofe of the other judges to the allowance of Carter's, and another volume or two of contemporary reports.

It is from the latter of these two perfons alone, that we derive the particulars of Milton's domestic manners, and these are exhibited

G 2

whom is derived the only authentick account of his do- !

meftic manners..

John, the poet, was born in his father's houfe, at the Spread-Eagle in Bread-street, Dec. 9, 1608, between fix and feven in the morning. His father appears to have been very folicitous about his education; for he was inftructed at first by private tuition under the care of Thomas Young, who was afterwards chaplain to the English merchants at Hamburgh; and of whom we have reason to think well, fince his scholar confidered him as worthy of an epiftolary Elegy.

He was then fent to St. Paul's Scool, under the care of Mr. Gill; and removed, in the beginning of his

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hibited in a life of him prefixed to a tranflation of his "State Let"ters, 1694, 12mo.' The two perfons abovementioned were men of literature, and are noticed by Wood. Edward, after having been a student of Magdalen hall, Oxford, became tutor to the fon of Mr. John Evelyn, of Say's court, and after that to the fons of fundry perfons of quality, and alfo to Ifabella, the daughter of lord Arlington, afterwards duchefs of Grafton; but at length he took up the trade of a writer and translator of books for a livelihood. Among other works he compiled a Dictionary, entitled, “ A new World of Words," which, till the publication of Bailey's, might be deemed the best in our language: he was alfo the continuator of Sir Richard Baker's Chronicle" to the restoration of Charles II. and, having the ufe of the duke of Albemarle's papers, has related the occurrences of that great event, but in a way. that gave great offence to bihop Nicolfon, who, with his ufual afperity, afferts that ambition and flattery carried him beyond truth and his copy. He appears to have been a friend to the royal caufe; but his brother John inherited the political, though not the. religious principles of his uncle: he wrote "Maronides, or two "books of Virgil trandated into burlesque verfe," pamphlets, and. fundry things of finall account at this day, and is thus described by Wood: "A man of very loofe principles, atheistical, forfakes "his wife and children, makes no provifion for them." Athen. Oxon. 2d edit. vol. II. 1116, et feq,

fixteenth

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